Prof. Charles Sanft (University of Tennessee)

Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences
cordially invites you to two talks from the Taiwan Lectures on Chinese Studies series by
Prof. Charles Sanft
(University of Tennessee)
1) Communication and Cooperation in Early Imperial China
The talk draws from received history, the results of archaeological excavation, and current secondary scholarship to
argue for the importance of non-coercive government under the early empire. It argues that despite its reputation as
a harsh and totalitarian regime, the Qin dynasty employed a sophisticated apparatus that sought not simply to
compel obedience to its order but also to persuade the population to accept its governance.
When: Monday, 11 May, 2015, 15:30-17:00
Where: Fairbank Library, Oriental Institute, Pod Vodarenskou Vezi 4, Prague 8
2) Household Registration Records from Liye: Household, Community, State
The bureaucracy of the Qin empire created and maintained power relationships between the state and the populace.
The most pervasive of its institutional systems was household registration, which theoretically recorded every
person in the realm. Each member of the populace in this way became known to the state in terms of core
identifying information, permitting the state to track individuals across time and geographical space. Even as this
system and its correlates gathered information about persons, they also disseminated information about the state, in
that they created knowledge of the government’s presence and reach throughout the newly constituted realm.
Historians have acquired new knowledge about these systems due to archaeological discoveries in recent decades,
particularly at Liye 里耶 , Hunan province, which have provided example documents from these systems. This
paper considers examples of relevant materials from Liye and discusses their implications for our understanding of
early imperial governance.
When: Tuesday, 12 May, 2015, 9:00-11:00
Where: Charles University, Celetna 20, Prague 1, room no. 118 (CCK-ISC)
Charles Sanft’s research focuses on the political thought and practice of early imperial China, from
around the late third century BCE into the first century CE. He has published articles on legal history,
ritual, and translations and studies of paleographic materials from the time in journals including Early
China, Environmental History, Asia Major, Frontiers of History in China, and others. His
book, Communication and Cooperation in Early Imperial China: Publicizing the Qin Dynasty, was
published by the State University of New York Press in 2014 as part of the SUNY series in Chinese
Philosophy and Culture.
Additional information:
- Charles Sanft’s webpages: http://history.utk.edu/peopletwo/charles-sanft/
- Oliver Weingarten’s review of Ch. Sanft, Communication and Cooperation in Early Imperial China
(http://chinet.cz/reviews/history/communication-and-cooperation-in-early-imperial-china-publicizing-theqin-dynasty/)
For more information see www.orient.cas.cz